If we can master our emotions, we’ll be less inclined to eat junk. And that is why I spend so much time writing and talking and thinking about happiness.

If we can work on ways to become happier and figure out ways to make ourselves happier, we’ll be setting ourselves up for success!

Here’s the problem, though.

All we ever heard as a kid was “stop crying” or “relax” or “calm down” or “everything will be alright!” But no one ever told us how to deal with complex emotions.

When our mind floods with emotions we might feel panicky or upset or anxious or angry. How about feelings like rage, loneliness, abandonment, shame? These feelings can be horrifying.

The challenge with feelings and thoughts is that we can’t control them. There are a lot of new-agey books that are sorta goofy in my opinion. Many suggest that we ‘let go of our ego’ and all sorts of things.

The reality is I can’t control my thoughts. They just pop into my head. As do my feelings.

If we were all going to a gorgeous island that was beaming with sun we’d go prepared with sun tan lotion. (One day I hope this is the case, as one of my dreams is to have an annual MBT retreat!)

Well, what if we prepared ourselves for when we’re sad or anxious or unhappy, etc?

What if we had a secret stash of things to do or look at or people to call when certain feelings arise? The idea here is to figure out ways to positively deal with our emotions.

The goal is to actually face them head on because we have a bunch of ways we can soothe ourselves that don’t require food. We don’t want to stop and then have to deal with them later on. And that’s what emotional eating is simply doing: delaying the inevitable.

It’s also important to remember that, like clouds, feeling and emotions do pass! We must remember this.

Remember: The monster is never as scary as it seems! Ever.

Emotional eating is one of the top causes of obesity in the world. Emotional eating is when we eat to change the way we feel. We’re not physically hungry, we’re hungry for something else.

We eat because we’re bored, lonely, miserable, stressed, anxious, uncomfortable, tired, or any one of a number of reasons – none of which has anything to do with real physical hunger.

Remember: Physical hunger comes on gradually. Emotional hunger comes on suddenly.

If you eat based on emotional/habitual/mindless hunger, your body will never feel satisfied by food. This is why emotional eaters never feel full. They never get the signal to stop eating because they weren’t hungry for food in the first place.

Many of us have the dysfunctional habit of eating when we feel upset, lonely, bored or just want to escape reality for a few minutes. This habit stems from a misunderstanding of why we feel what we feel.

Let’s think of an emotion as someone knocking on your door to deliver a message. If the message is urgent the knock is loud. If it’s very urgent it’s very loud. But if it’s very urgent and you don’t answer the door, the knock will get louder and louder until we open the door or the door gets broken down!

Either way, the messenger will keep trying until it delivers the message. Just like our emotions will continue to come up until we finally pay attention to them.

And as soon as we ‘open the door’ by listening to the emotional message and taking action, the emotion will go away. And if it comes back, it won’t be nearly as loud.

You don’t have to be a victim anymore if you’re willing to open the door.

So onto one of the most powerful questions you can ever ask yourself when it comes to food:

Drum roll please!

“Am I hungry, or am I eating to change the way I feel?”

It turns out that 95% of the time when we eat poorly, we’re eating because of the way we feel.

The scary part is that when we actually open the door, and listen to the message, we may not like what we hear. We may get scared, we may want to crawl up into a little ball, and we may want to do a lot of things. That’s okay. At least you faced the monster!

The only way to overcome emotional eating is to engage in some self-discovery. To listen to what you really want (hint: it’s not food). And the more you tell me on your feedback, the sooner we can identify triggers and come up with strategies that work for you.

I’ve helped many people who are lifelong emotional eaters overcome their emotional eating. As rewarding as it is for me, it’s even more rewarding for them. As scary as it might seem, it’s worth ‘opening the door’.

I’m right here for you. In fact, I’ll be right next to you when you open the door.

“Am I hungry, or am I eating to change the way I feel?”

Next week, we’ll talk about 3 questions you can ask yourself once you realize you’re not hungry for food and also why we’re so scared to actually open the door.

I hope you had a wonderful, fun and healthy weekend! And if it wasn’t so healthy, that’s what today is for.

Question: Does confusion mess you up?

I think we can all agree that stress makes us eat. Or grief. Or celebration. But what about when we feel all wound up but we just don’t know what exactly is bothering us except that we feel a little crazy?

The laundry is piled to the ceiling, your co-worker is not being nice, your kids are being unappreciative and fresh, your boss is being a jerk, your boyfriend/girlfriend/husband/wife is giving you the cold shoulder, your friend let you down, the computer broke again…

And you just want to escape! For many of us, when we feel these emotions, food feels like the perfect escape. It’s an easy way out.

Or is it?

The problem with emotionally eating is that when you’re done eating, the problems and feelings will still be there!

The key is to slow down and identify the real problem. It’s very tempting to resort to a ‘food coma’ or ‘food trance’ but that’s not going to make anything better in the long run.

Instead, slow down. Look. Listen and feel.

Instead of eating how about:

Thinking things through…
Talking to a friend…
Meditating…
Writing…
Waiting before acting…
Going for a walk…
Thinking of 3 things you can do to make the problem better…

The problem with resorting to food is that you’ll never understand what you’re really feeling.

Food gives us a momentary escape – instant gratification – but we must remember that although it might make things seem better in the very short term, the problem will keep coming up again and again.

It’s like the annoying neighbor who won’t stop knocking until you answer the door. Eventually, you just gotta answer the door!

Be aware of what you’re really feeling and answer the door this week!

Your to do: When you hear the ‘knock, knock’ ask, ‘Who’s there?!’ don’t just drown it out.

I hope you had a fun Memorial Day weekend! You know, it’s shocking (and saddening) how many people take for granted the freedom our country allows us. Even more so how we forget those who have passed away protecting our country.

Whether you agree with the war or not, I believe it’s important to honor and remember all of our fallen soldiers. I know my grandpa – may he rest in peace – fought in WWII and I’ll never forget the few times he spoke about the war.

I was happy to see that on 60 minutes this past Sunday, they had a segment about volunteers who go about looking for IEDs in order to protect us overseas. It was also about those who’ve lost their lives trying to protect us doing so.

When one of the men was asked if he was scared, he replied with, “Being scared lets you know you’re alive.”

Then the interviewer asked another soldier, “What does it take to do this job?” I loved his answer, “A belief that you’re making a difference.”

Let’s explore both of these statements and how they might apply to us:

Overeating isn’t about food. It’s about emotions. It’s about being addicted to the “food trance” eating gives us. Think about it – when you’re eating do you feel anything? Usually, we don’t. So we continue to eat and eat so we don’t feel anything.

But that’s not life! One can’t appreciate great feelings if they’ve never endured bad feelings. One can’t appreciate great tasting chicken, if they’ve never tasted bad chicken either!

The bad makes the good that much better because without the bad how could we know the difference?

We’re so afraid to feel. Just because you feel pain or hurt or discomfort, doesn’t mean you have to listen to it or acknowledge it.

Some potential mantras that come to mind:

“Feel the feeling and do it anyway.”

“Feel the pain and do it anyway.”

“Feel the discomfort and keep on going.”

“Just because the feeling is there it doesn’t mean you have to stop and listen to it.”

“Just because we feel something doesn’t mean we have to let it derail our plans.”

The next statement, “a belief that you’re making a difference,” is awesome! Let’s see how it might apply to our health and fitness journey.

If you don’t believe that eating right and exercising will make a difference in how you look and how you feel then it’ll be very hard to stick to this. If you don’t believe that making sacrifices and compromises throughout the day add up, then it’ll be hard to stick to this.

One of the main reasons why I’m so into ‘bodybuilding’ is because I find it to be so empowering. The fact that my food choices, and how I exercise affect how my body looks and works is so cool to me!

Newsflash: We’re all ‘bodybuilders’.

We’re all in control. But if you don’t believe that your choices affect your health, your waist line and your feelings, you won’t continually fight each and every battle to make the right choices between our short term self and our long term self.

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Over two months ago, I wrote about the Academy Award winning movie Hurt Locker. The main character diffuses IEDs as well. You can read that post here.